Fear and Drinking in Las Vegas

Hi. I'm back. From Vegas.

As it turns out, what happens in Vegas actually DOESN'T stay in Vegas and the reason for this is that I have a blog. The trip was ostensibly for the Tai's Til 4 family of employees and patrons to attend the bar and restaurant show which was in town. The real reason was for us all to get very very drunk and gamble a lot. I've been trying to write this post for 3 days now, but for some reason these people keep giving me work to do. So instead of the original post I was going to write that would have taken you six days to read, I now present the abridged version:

• The bartender, who was my roommate for the trip, and I headed over to Paris the first day to sit in the sports book. I am not a gambler myself, so I was basically there just to watch television. The bartender finds this "not gambling" thing completely foreign and set out trying to convert me by teaching me how to read stat sheets. He might have had a better chance if he hadn't started the lesson with, "Hey math geek, check this out."
• Later that evening, we traipsed over to New York New York and met MrSteve for drinks at the Irish bar. We proceeded to get very drunk. Also, I spent a lot of time staring at our bartender, whose nametag said he was called Lee, because he was the most beautiful boy I have ever seen. In our drunk, the three of us decided the best course of action would be to all stand near the bar, pull out our phones, and start texting people we left in Chicago, where it was approximately 3 a.m. It seems we texted Brandon a few times, which he was very pleased about given that he had to get up in the morning for his first day at a new job. Also, all three of us sent a barrage of messages to Big Charlie, who was also drunk. A good time was had by all.
• The second day, MrSteve and I decide it's time to hit the Star Trek Museum. This was by far the thing I was most looking forward to in Vegas, because I am a huge geek. Luckily, MrSteve also likes to get his geek on so I had a partner. There are two rides at the museum. The first one we went on was Klingon Encounter, where I got to stand on the bridge of the Enterprise, somewhere near the tactical station (hello, NERD!). Somehow Steve and I managed to lose each other in the gift shop after the first ride, and I ended up going on the second ride by myself. This was a mistake because I had no one to grab onto when the Borg started jumping out from behind things and dragging people away to be assimilated. I assure you, it was one of the most frightening experiences of my life.
• Afterwards, MrSteve and I decide to hit up Quark's Bar for an alcoholic beverage. This beverage is called a Warp Core Breach. It is served with dry ice in it so that it smokes and bubbles, and it tastes like purple. While enjoying this, a very drunk woman began trying to start a very loud an incoherent conversation with us. Eventually we moved down to sit closer to her and her husband. Their names were Don and Matilda (I know there's a Waltzing Matilda joke in there somewhere, but I just can't find it) and they were at the Star Trek museum celebrating their 21st wedding anniversary. Don was very nice and normal, was a 49ers fan and talked football with me for some time, while MrSteve was dragged by Matilda into a conversation I'm not entirely sure he needed to be there for. All was well until suddenly I found Matilda behind me, playing with my hair and stroking my neck. Much as I enjoy people playing with my hair, it's kind of creepy when total strangers do it, and I was more than a little freaked out.
• That night, a large group of us went over to The Foundation Room for some fun and vodka. We were waiting for a few late comers to show up when the body came over to the bartender and me and told us he'd taken some new pictures on his phone he wanted to show us. Apparently he'd gone out and hooked up with not one, but two different women his first night in Vegas. Which we didn't know when he came walking up to us and so we were totally unprepared for his pictures. We both stood with our mouths hanging open as the body narrated his little slide show: "This is a picture of her tits, and this is a picture of her sucking my dick, and this is a picture of me sticking it in her ass..." He looked at us for our approval of his two conquests, but we were a little bit freaked out. All the bartender could manage was "I can't believe I just saw your dick."
• The next day I woke up with a fever and a sore throat, because that is exactly what I should have been expecting on my first real vacation in 10 years. Needless to say I was pretty upset, though not as upset as the bartender was. We had discovered the day before when Steve and I went to Star Trek that I was the bartenders lucky charm. Whenever I was standing next to him he won, and whenever I was somewhere else he lost. He had taken to dragging me around with him to all his favorite slot machines and rubbing my head for luck. Sure enough he lost that day.
• The bartender was waiting for a phone call from his friend who was driving us to the airport on our last day. When the phone call came he had just gotten out of the shower and came running out of the bathroom stark raving naked to answer it. This made me extremely happy because I think he should be naked all the time. Later when he was dressed he asked me if I was feeling any better. I told him it should be obvious that I wasn't by the fact that I didn't attack him when he was running around all nekkid, which he agreed was a good point.
• Ever gotten on a plane when you're sick? Don't. It sucks about seven kinds of ass. It sucks about 700 kinds of ass when you're sick and sitting next to Fatty McGee who is taking up half your seat and can't seem to sit still, and also you're in an aisle seat and are prone to motion sickness and really really need to be by a window, and also you want to try to sleep but four other people on the plane are snoring like it's their job, and also there's so much turbulence that you're sure the plane is going to fall right out if the sky.

So those are the highlights (and lowlights) of Amberance Goes to Vegas 2006. Stay tuned for Amberance Goes to Florida in May and Football Season: Vegas Strikes Back sometime in the fall.